Why is Blue State Digital in Iraq?

In a relatively unnoticed State Department press briefing yesterday, Acting Department Spokesman Robert Wood announced a delegation of new media executives that left for Iraq on an official, government-paid trip on Sunday. According to Wood, the purpose would be to “explore new opportunities to support Iraqi Government and nongovernment stakeholders in Iraq’s emerging new media industry.”

All in all, this is a well thought out trip, and yet another implicit admission by the President that another thing he inherited from his predecessor is a budding democracy in the Arab world, one with a civil society to support. Exactly two years to the day after Majority Leader Harry Reid declared the war “lost”, President Obama is sending high-tech executives to Baghdad to talk business amidst vastly improved conditions. The delegation is made up of executives from Google, YouTube, Twitter, WordPress, MeetUp, Howcast and AT&T. All logical since most of those technologies will be used to share this story and are industry titans. However, one member of this delegation is Blue State Digital Vice President David Nassar. Who is David Nassar, and what is Blue State Digital?

In his Washington Post column describing the trip, Ed O’Keefe stated: “President Obama and Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton and just about every other presidential contender used many of the technologies provided by the companies represented on the trip for outreach, organizing and fundraising during the 2008 campaign.” All except one. Only one presidential campaign used one of the delegation members.

Blue State Digital is the major web design contractor for the Democratic National Committee, Obama for America, the AFL-CIO, SEIU, Planned Parenthood, Rainbow Coalition, and a number of other liberal Senatorial, Congressional and issue advocacy campaigns. Unlike his counterparts in the delegation, Mr. Nassar’s professional activities are purely political in nature, and are wholly supportive of only the most liberal causes.

Aside from the appearance value of sending one of their campaign buddies on a trip to Baghdad, one might ask what else is wrong? Maybe his web developing insight was invaluable? Maybe. But that insight is available from a number of non-partisan web developers as well, like perhaps GoDaddy.com. Before working tirelessly against Wal Mart, Mr. Nassar did in fact have some experience with Middle East affairs. Maybe that was the reason? Well, if they were looking for mideast insight on this trip, this probably wasn’t the type of delegation to send.

Unfortunately, this may boil down to lucrative government contracts. The U.S. gives billions of dollars to Iraq annually to develop their government infrastructure. The Iraqi government is often forced to do business with the options they are given so they can to get their operations up and running. When it comes to new media companies, they will have the benefit of personally getting to know eight companies this week, only one of which is not an internationally recognized leader in their field.

Without competition, or American rules of low-bid contracts, President Obama has set up his political pals at Blue State Digital to reap large rewards in Iraq, possibly in return for their hard campaign work in 2008. This might not be the case, and Blue State Digital may never accept any contracts within Iraq. But if they do, would it not have been appropriate to send either non-partisan developers or at the very least, a balance of conservative and liberal developers to Iraq? This situation is exactly the type that gives the appearance of government corruption and erodes the public’s confidence in the executive branch. Sending a partisan, political consultant to Iraq to “explore new opportunities” should not have a first priority of the State Department.

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Rory Cooper is Director of Strategic Communications at The Heritage Foundation. In this position, Cooper coordinates the think tank’s external message and internal communications, manages its entire digital communications and social media portfolios, and develops new media partnerships. Cooper also serves as the executive editor for The Foundry, the conservative policy news blog at Heritage.

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we need to do whatever it takes to save our country from the obama factor and his henchmen. in my opinon he should be impeached now along with reid and pelosi.this is the greatest threat we face now.they want to turn our country into a communist regime.i love my freedom and dont want to be a commie.out with obama down with reid and pelosi.theres no other way.

I wouldn't worry about Blue State Digital in Iraq. As is typical with leftist liberals, they truly believe they're in control of everything. From social norms to human life, the natural world, religious beliefs, political thought, you name it. They're so much in control that they're alienating American states and foreign nations with their forced and heavy handed, tax payer funded, fiscal aid packages. It's do as we say or you'll be punished. Does such a sickle hammer approach sound familiar?

For the record, I'm damned tired of folks like Fox's Geraldo Rivera referring to Texas' governor as a traitor. What people like him fail to acknowledge is that the Texas Republic, upon becoming a state, always reserved the right to secede from the union. The Beltway demagogues have no control over this fact. Self-righteous media pundits, such as Geraldo, are the ones standing on the wrong side of the line.

Socialist dictators of the past used to send a political operative to any gathering or conferences to spy and report back to the dictator to make sure the rest of the delegation toe the line. Obama is no different. Didn't you see how he behaves when he gets outside the US? He despises our country with the Constitutional heritage and is changing it to a socialist dictatorship, just like the one in Venezuela.

SECTION 1. Texas is a free and independent State … and the perpetuity of the Union depend upon the preservation of the right of local self-government unimpaired to all the States.

SEC. 2. … The faith of the people of Texas stands pledged to the preservation of a republican form of government, and, subject to this limitation only, they have at all times the inalienable right to alter, reform or abolish their government in such manner as they may think expedient.

Allow me to share a quick history lesson about Texas. Liberals, to include the opinion of a few of the state's librarians and extremist groups, want to believe that Texas never reserved the right to secede. They call this mindset a myth. To end all debate, they'll eventually bring up President Andrew Johnson's post civil war proclamation discussing the end of hostilities. In fact, two proclamations were drafted with similar conditions, one for the other Southern states and a separate one for Texas. This is the post civil war president's own admission that Texas could still legally secede. He apparently wanted to avoid muddying the waters with the other Southern states. The cover story for why Texas' had been singled out was "continued hostilities". As always, a grain of truth is as good as a lie. Pockets of hostility continued within the other Southern states as well. The point is Texas was its own nation and originally entered the union with a simple resolution. A treaty was never signed. Texas retained all her public lands and debts. She's an independent state that has always retained the right to withdraw from the union. Texas' Governor Perry is standing on firm legal ground. It's the national media and leftist propaganda that has it all wrong.

I owe the folks at HF and other bloggers an apology. My account of Andrew Johnson's post civil war proclamations was misleading. This post war president dealt with enough demons during his lifetime. He doesn't need me muddying his memory with false and unsupported information. I got carried away with a single archived document that was specific only to Texas without looking at the larger history surrounding it. For this reason, I was wrong and retract the aforementioned "history lesson". Governor Perry still has my support about Texas' constitutional right to divorce itself from a dysfunctional union. Such a choice belongs only to Texans and not to any court at any time. Again, my sincerest apology. jh

This is a payback move pure and simple. Blue State Digital doesn't belong on this delegation period. It gives the impression of impropriety because it is….improper. If the new gov't of Iraqi and leaders are going to be indoctrinated in the ways of the social media force…we need to strike balance. Maybe it's just an innocuous deal…doesn't look that way and we're talking about it. #FAIL.

[…] Has Pot Gone Mainstream? – E. Morrissey, HotAir What Would You Say You Do Here? – Ezra Klein Why Is Blue State Digital in Iraq? – R. Cooper, The Foundry Cruel to be King – J. Cole, Balloon Juice The Tea Party Movement is Real – […]

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